Take a look at how I played Mass Effect 2. I started it in February and didn’t finish until a couple of months later. Yes, it’s a huge game, but I played through it at a snail’s pace.

I take my time playing games because life is busy. Family, friends, cooking, writing, reading, volunteering, biking, running, and all the other hobbies in my life take up time.

Other snails might have their own reasons for taking so much time to finish a game. Their interest in video games might wax and wane. They could be playing games for the first time. They might feel the need to collect everything and see the number “100%” pop up. Or maybe a pesky bird swooped down from the sky and tried to eat them. Who knows for sure?

But one thing is certain about snails: it takes them a while to cross the finish line in a game.

That’s One Fast Hedgehog!

Hedgehogs – like Sonic – are the opposite of snails. Hedgehogs race through the latest game so they can play the next one. They might finish video games, but they don’t stick around long after they’ve done everything.

Why are they so fast? I suspect hedgehogs want to play all the good games that come out during the year. Perhaps they crave variety to have fun.

20 responses to “Help! I’m a Video Game Snail”

I think I’m a snail. There’s a lot of games I’ve started that I haven’t finished (like Kingdom Hearts 358/2 Days). I got close to finishing The Legend of Zelda: Wind Waker once, and I mean final-dungeon-and-about-to-fight-sub-final-boss close. Then, one day when I stared up the game, it said that the memory card needed to be re-formatted, and I would lose all of my saved files. I haven’t played that game since.

That was actually the second time that that had happened. The first time it happened, not only did I have to re-do everything I had done in Wind Waker, but I also lost all of my Star Fox: Adventures data. I had made it about half-way through too. I was at the Krazoa Test of Fear segment. Needless to say, I haven’t really played it in a long time either.

Maybe I’ll go back to it someday. One of my favorite things about the game was that there was quite a few Easter Eggs at one point in the game, including what appears to be concept art for Dash, and a depiction of a future cutscene in Star Fox: Assault.

I’m, without a doubt, a video game snail! It takes me at least a couple months to finish a game, and open world/role playing games, it can take even longer! It’s not that I’m a completionist, but I just don’t have much time to play — maybe a couple hours over a weekend at most. I’ll admit to once being a bit jealous of the video game hedgehogs, but I relish my gaming time when I get it. It’s never something I take for granted.

I think I’m both, I want to see EVERYTHING in the game, especially Mass Effect, I played it through about 7 times before I moved on, but I do this relatively quickly each time. Mass Effect 3 took 40 hours to complete on my last go, but I did it over the course of one weekend (insomnia for the win!). I try and get most of the achievements in a game because then it’s more likely I’ve seen everything the devs want me to see. 🙂

Ah, now that is an interesting comment. 🙂 A snail/hedgehog who sees everything as quickly as possible. Hmmm, yes, that is a good twist to the dichotomy I presented in the post. Thanks for the great comment.